


bleed to love her

by timelxrd



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Amnesia, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, This might not make sense, Whump, and poor plot skills, blame my lack of sleep, describe this, dont know how to, hurt/comfort???, i actually, if so, thasmin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-19
Updated: 2019-09-21
Packaged: 2020-10-24 07:35:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20702288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/timelxrd/pseuds/timelxrd
Summary: She probably just needs some sleep, she ponders, earning a hum of agreement from the central column of the TARDIS, but there was something in her short dream she’s desperate to retrace — a face, distinct yet blurred, warm and unfamiliar, yet distant.





	1. i forget about time and space (but i can't stop thinking about your face)

**Author's Note:**

> thanks to gee and charlie for the help with this ily
> 
> tw: mentions of blood

Consciousness creeps upon her like thieves in the night, slowly, then all at once. 

She blinks awake to a throbbing head and aching limbs, the latter she puts down the purple sofa she’s found herself sprawled out across — she can’t recall where it came from, but she’s certainly never dozing off there again. 

The lights above her dim in a silent suggestion for the disorientated Time Lord to drag herself to bed for some much-needed recuperation. 

She rests there for a little longer to gather her wits about her. When her headache persists, she sighs, reaching up to massage her temples in the hopes it’ll ease the tension there. 

She probably just needs some sleep, she ponders, earning a hum of agreement from the central column of the TARDIS, but there was something in her short dream she’s desperate to retrace — a face, distinct yet blurred, warm and unfamiliar, yet distant. 

The Doctor feels like a child reaching for the top shelf of a cupboard, the memory just out of reach, a jar full of cookies mocking her from its impossible perch. 

The harder she tries, the heavier her head grows, the stronger, more prominent the pain which blossoms there like passiflora in mid-September sun. 

When she reaches out to touch her hand to the console, sparks ignite beneath her fingertips, a chiding warning from her ship. “Alright, alright, _ mum _. I’m going to bed.”

She takes a slow inhale through her nose, the faint tang of iron rolling in like a wave from the back of her throat and startling her enough to bring her fingers to her top lip. Fresh crimson coats the pads of her index and forefinger, inducing a faint flurry of panic. 

The Doctor finds herself running to her bathroom before the thought even registers with her — It’s not as bad as she’d expected, a short-lived nosebleed halted in its progress behind a scrunched-up ball of tissue paper. Dark rings encircle her eyes and exhaustion wanes at her usually sprightly appearance when she catches sight of herself in the mirror.

When the bleeding slows to a stop, she ducks her head to wash away its remnants, then watches as rose-tinted water swirls in a perfect spiral down the plughole. 

“_ Some hangover,” _she theorises for the hours of time she’s misplaced. She pads towards her bed, foregoing her boots and coat before she exhaustedly flops on top of fresh sheets, spent and aching. 

When slumber embraces her form, it does so with full-force. It shouldn’t be surprising, really, when she’d been sacrificing sleep for adventures with her fam. Unmistakenly, however, the bed feels a little empty — more so than usual, at least, but she can’t understand why. 

The same image from earlier creeps up amidst dreams of old friends and expanses of desert, forest, cities climbing high and spreading far, and she clutches onto it, unwilling to let go until sleep washes away and pain strikes once more. Her ears are ringing when she jerks awake, copper clinging to her tongue and dribbling in a lazy stream from her nose. “Something’s wrong.”

Four more failed attempts to sleep later, the Doctor lays awake, holding a wad of tissue paper to her nose. She stares up at her bedroom ceiling, where the milky way usually works to set her thoughts at ease and her eyelids heavy. “What happened yesterday? Who’s in my head, old girl?” 

She rolls over, clutching her spare pillow to her chest and curling around it. It smells different, the scent of coconut shampoo and the hint of sweet perfume overriding laundry detergent. Had someone else been taking residence beside her until recently? When she tries to recall such a revelation, a sharp shooting pain returns to the space behind her eyes and leaves her squirming into dishevelled sheets until she can’t quite see clearly. 

“_What’s_ _happening?” _the usually strong Time Lord whimpers into star-dusted material, hands coming to rest over her each side of her head as the sudden migraine peaks, then starts to ease again. 

_ So much for the oncoming storm _, she thinks to herself slyly, unravelling from her bed and slipping to her feet once the pain has subsided enough. She’s drained, grumpy and frustrated — it’s as though someone or something has chiselled through her skull and left a ticking time bomb in her head, warning strikes building up to… something she doesn’t want to think about. 

But, she concludes, it only occurs when she attempts to think back to the day previous, or the cloudy image of the woman inhabiting her dreams. She scribbles the theory down and pins it to the display board at the forefront of her mind. 

When she supposes the god of slumber isn’t on her side, the Doctor slips into the bathroom and starts the shower running. “Cheers, Hypnos. After everything I did for you and your boyfriend, the _ least _ you could give me is a quick power nap,” she huffs into the empty room, earning a series of thrums from her ship which sound suspiciously like laughter. “Don’t you start!” 

She peels away clammy, blood-stained clothes and steps into the shower with a sigh, rubbing at tired eyes. The close to scalding water relaxes tense, aching muscles the second the Doctor steps under the spray, leaving her to groan audibly, closing her eyes to tip her head back into its path. 

From the walls, the TARDIS begins playing a children’s bedtime lullaby, encouraging an amused scoff and a glare from its solitary pilot. “Oi, lay off it. I’ll be fine.”

When the mixture of hot water and a _ finally _ quiet mind has her leaning against the blue-tiled walls, her eyes drooping closed, one such tile slides open to reveal a water pistol. It’s level with her nose, and the blonde has no choice but to take cold, icy water straight to her face. “For Rassilon’s sake! I was just resting my eyes!”

Despite the scrunch to her nose, the Doctor can’t help but laugh at her ship’s sense of humour. Some things change, but some things _ definitely _ stay the same. 

She cards her fingers through sodden locks before she reaches for a bottle of shampoo, hands blindly settling for the coconut-scented one in the corner. “Coconut?” she questions her ship, brows pinching. “I know someone who uses this — used to? Help me out here — am I finally going mad?” She aims the questions at the four walls around her, expression contorting in thought.

The minute she opens the bottle and takes in the familiar aroma, it’s as though a shock of electricity ignites her veins and sends a strike towards her cerebrum. The scent is comforting enough to make her heart flutter at first, but the agony now cursing through her head makes her regret questioning it in the first place. 

She manages to keep her stance this time, letting out a muted whimper while she massages the gel through blonde strands. By the time she’s done, her hands are trembling, but not from the cold she’s exposed to the second she steps out of boiling water. 

The Time Lord is struck once more when she picks up a hairbrush beside the sink, littered with dark, curly hair, studying the object through a blur of sharp, targetted pain. 

By the time the Doctor navigates her way to Sheffield for a new adventure with her best friends, she’s reeling with questions, her movements a little clumsier than usual due to her fatigue. 

She lands without incident, thankfully, and while she’s waiting, she seeks answers. 

“Connect me up to the circuits, old girl. Something feels very, very wrong, and there’s only one way to find out why. Can you go back —” she pauses, checking the watch hugging her wrist,“ — thirteen hours?” 

She slips her hands under one of the panels of her console, sliding it away and curling her palms around what looks, to an outsider, like a crystal ball. It’s golden, of course. “Love the design this time, by the way.” 

There’s a warning spark beneath her fingertips which the Doctor ignores, instead closing her eyes while she links a pair of wires to her temples, then returns her hands to the console. 

She focuses her mind on the vision haunting her thoughts, teeth gritted as she works to piece together the last half a day. She gets flashes and snippets of events while she zeroes in on the last few hours in particular, and that’s when the tell-tale pangs of a migraine begin again. “Come on…” 

There’s a small breakthrough when the foggy view of someone’s side-profile returns, but by this time she’s too weak, in too much agony, and too exhausted to hold on. She breaks away from the console with a cry, dropping to her knees. The wires connected to her temples tear lightly at her skin at the sudden disconnection, blood falling like raindrops from her nose into her palms while she slumps against the nearest crystal pillar. 

Her back is to the door when Ryan and Graham enter boisterously ten minutes and thirty-three seconds later, unaware of the Doctor’s disposition. 

“Oi, Doc. Yaz is gonna have words with you, so you better prepare yourself. Something about missing date night?” Graham warns, teasing, playful. 

Ryan jogs up after him, taking in the sight of the Time Lord all but curled in on herself and instantly heading to her side. 

_ Yaz. Yaz. Yaz… _The name starts a chant in her head, drops of blood turning into a steady flow, her brain burning up like oak and leaves in sweltering summer heat, reflected in glass and pinpointing her cells one by one. 

The Time Lord turns, head pounding, the corners of her eyes creasing, her palms gathering crimson. 

“Who’s Yaz?”


	2. and i'm fighting not to feel (but nothing works)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> as usual this is softer than i intended im so sorry

“Pretending you don’t know someone is _no_ _way _to avoid a domestic, Doc,” Graham chides, shoving his hands into the pockets of his puffer coat as he steps up to the console. 

“Grandad, stop,” Ryan warns from the Doctor’s side, where he takes in the dry blood lacing her top lip and the clear confusion dancing in hazel-green pools. “She’s serious.”

When the blonde moves to stand, using the back of her hand to wipe away the moisture coating her nostrils, she stumbles, weak, tired. 

“Doctor, Yaz is your _ girlfriend — _you’re practically inseparable.” Ryan moves to stabilise her when she threatens to fall to the corrugated metal floor once more, the name inviting another stab to the space between her brows. “What’s happened? Why don’t you remember her?”

“I’m fine,” she murmurs through gritted teeth, knuckles white with their grasp on the console. Her mind reels with the new information, and suddenly, things start to make sense — her lonely bed, the shampoo, the hairbrush, the undisputed heaviness to her hearts.

However, for the lives of her, she still can’t remember.

“Did you — did you say _ girlfriend? _”

“They did, yeah,” Yaz suddenly murmurs from the doorway, hurt dancing in pupils the Doctor only recognises from her dreams. She has her arms folded and she looks a little angry, but it gives way to concern as soon as she takes in the sight. “You missed our da —” she pauses, spotting the blood drying just below her nose, “ — _ Doctor _, are you alright?"

She stiffens the second Yaz steps inside, freezing up as a whole new wave of agony bares itself to her cerebrum, garnering her knees weak and her head heavier than ever. She slumps to the floor with a gasp, curling her hands into engineered metal. 

“Doctor?” Yaz calls again, gaze flicking between her two clueless best friends before dropping back to her girlfriend. Her eyes widen in horror when she begins writhing — the Doctor is usually the type to spend days on end with no complaints of aching feet, blisters, or desperate hunger, so to see her so tortured makes the hair on the back of her neck stand on end and an uncomfortable weight settle on her chest.

She jogs over, but with every footfall, the Doctor cries and gasps out louder, squeezing her eyes closed as she scrabbles for something to cling to, to anchor herself to, to work the pain rattling her brain into her fingertips. Blood drips carelessly onto the rainbow emblazoned across her chest while she curls up into the fetal position. 

By the time Yaz is at her side, she’s trembling, teeth chattering, and scrambling to move from her reach. “Please,” she whispers hoarsely, raising her arms up to curl her hands through her hair and drag her nails against her scalp, clawing at the blossoming pain there. 

“Please _ what _, Doctor?” Yaz pipes up, and her voice is so soft, so kind, so distinctly familiar that the Time Lord’s brain all but constricts under the siege of an unknown virus. 

It’s as though there’s a newly-constructed barrier built in her mind, and with each mere millimetre the unknown woman closes between them, it grows stronger, harder to breach; so if it crumbles, it’ll take everything she feels, sees and thinks with it. 

“Please —” she falters, whimpering when Yaz makes an attempt to touch a hand to her forearm. She roughly jerks the limb from her reach, “ — please don’t touch me.” She can _ hear _ the other woman’s heart break into a thousand crimson pieces before she opens her eyes, just briefly, to see the anguish drawing full lips southward. 

With nothing short of a grimace, the Time Lord looks desperately up to Ryan and Graham. “Take — _ah — _take her back to the doors, _please_. I’m burning up — my whole head is on fire, and — _Rassilon — _whatever this is, Yaz is the trigger.” 

“But you’re hurting — I just want to —” Yaz acquests, but she doesn’t resist when Ryan gently leads her away. “ — help,” she finishes in a whisper, curling her arms around herself as she leans against the main doors to the ship, as though reassuring herself while the Time Lord cannot. “Is there _ anything _ I can do?” 

“I’m sorry,” the Doctor murmurs gently, their distance allowing for an ease in the headache still ever-present in her head. In the reprieve, she pulls herself up, leaning back against the purple sofa to catch her breath back and muster her strength. “Not until we find out what’s happened,” despite the reaction she’d suffered from their proximity, for some reason she still wants the other woman close — she yearns for it like a moth to a flame.

Blinking out of her tendency to over-think, if only to stop her nosebleed continuing, the Doctor turns, still too drained to draw herself to her feet. “Graham, can you pass me one of those wires? The yellow one, please.”

“What’s this for, then, Doc?” the middle-aged man queries, reeling the wire from the console as though from a pulley system and handing the end to the exhausted alien. 

“If I connect up to this, the TARDIS can take a quick scan of my brain and see what’s happening in there. Then we can figure out a plan to get my memories back.” She settles the end of the wire to her temple and sits back with a sigh, limbs aching, head throbbing. 

Ryan remains at Yaz’s side, reaching out to rest a supportive hand against her shoulder. “You okay?” he whispers, quiet enough not to disturb the other two. His words are laced with empathy, gaze quietly concerned as he takes in his friend’s forlorn expression. 

“She really doesn’t remember me, does she?” Yaz murmurs sadly, lacking her usual optimism. She watches the blonde in the way one steals glances of an unattainable crush; she thinks she’s already lost her. “I should’ve known something like this would happen, I just — I wish there was more time. I wish we had more time.” She laughs, but it’s a little empty. 

“Hey, hey. None of that, mate,” Ryan shakes his head, determined that they’ll fix the situation like they always do. “I can see something in her eyes when she looks at you — there’s no way those memories will be lost forever, they’re just under the surface.”

When Yaz next flits her gaze back to the alien in question, there’s a spark at the console and the monitor flickers to life, loading the results of her scan. She has to resist jogging forward, rocking slightly with the lost momentum. She’d better keep her distance for now — the last thing in the universe she wants to see is her girlfriend in agonising pain again. 

“What does it say?” she asks, instead, stepping back while Ryan hops up to the console. 

“Kodian virus detected,” Ryan reads aloud from the screen, the name unfamiliar. 

When three sets of eyes turn towards the Doctor, she takes a moment to think through the fog coating her mind before slapping her palm to her forehead. She scrunches her nose, as though surprised that the action has the audacity to sting her skin. “Of course! Thick town, Thickania; here I come. Sorry, fam, I’m being slow today.” 

As if reading her mind, the TARDIS console springs up a fresh, steaming mug of coffee, and it’s enough to finally bring its pilot to her feet. The Doctor rounds to the console and scoops up the hot beverage with a grateful pat to its golden components, while Graham, the usual coffee-fetcher, simply glares at the ship in silent exasperation. 

“So, you gonna explain what’s going on, Doctor?” Ryan quips while the alien successfully scolds her tongue — she’s back to normal, but he can tell from the white knuckles fisted in her coat that she’s only just keeping the pain at bay.

“The Kodians are a long-lasting species of telepaths, but instead of doing good, which I’ve _ tried and tried _ countless times to encourage, they use it to harness more power.” Behind her, a hologram of such a race appears. They look harmless enough, like penguins but with longer legs and small, humanoid arms encased behind their wings. 

“They look pretty cute,” Ryan admits, tilting his head as he pads forward for a better look. 

“They are until they use your most prominent memories at the time just to charge their bloody ship,” the Doctor concludes before she has time to think, pupils widening. Her head cocks to the side like a puppy confused over a command, a look Yaz never fails to melt at. This time isn’t any different. “Oh.”

“I mean — that would make the most sense, Doc,” Graham confirms, folding his arms and giving a self-assured nod. 

“You see? Coffee solves everything.” The Doctor groggily taps away at the monitor for a few moments, then leans back on her heels. “It just means that — well, in order to get any memories I’ve lost _ back _ , I’ll need some help. I’m going to have to connect up to the telepathic circuits and feed into the console, and whoever’s most prevalent in those memories, has to access that feed and _ literally _ break the barrier down.” 

“I can do it,” Yaz states right off the bat, stepping forward without thinking. When the Doctor winces subconsciously, she steps back again, ducking her head dejectedly. “As long as it doesn’t hurt you?”

“Oh, yeah. Won’t hurt a bit. Just a twinge,” the Doctor lies, earning three chiding frowns in her direction. “Alright, alright — it will, but not for long, I can promise that. You seem pretty strong, Yaz, from what I can see. I’m sure I’m in the best possible hands.”

The unsure tone she uses to indirectly compliment her has what little hope Ryan garnered her dissipating slowly into the corrugated metal beneath her feet. “Well — what are we waiting for?” 

“That’s the spirit.” The Doctor smiles for the first time since her friends had stepped aboard, draining the rest of her mug and setting it aside.

Once cables have been reeled from their respective purchase within the console and they’ve landed somewhere deemed safe enough, for now, the Time Lord motions for her mysterious ‘girlfriend’ to pad towards her. 

When Yaz falters, brows pinching as she remembers what happened the last time they were close enough to touch, the blonde offers a somewhat reassuring smile. “It’s okay, I'll just — I'll try not to think too hard this time. C’mon.”

Close enough to reach the panels on the console, but with enough distance to ensure she doesn’t involuntarily harm the Time Lord further, Yaz clips the cables to her temples. She avoids glancing at the blonde beside her, who silently quivers with unquelled pain. 

“You were in my dreams last night — I couldn’t see you properly, mind you, just little snippets. But if I can’t escape you even when there’s something in my head preventing you from ever existing in my lives, you must be pretty important, Yaz,” the Doctor whispers into the space between them, lines broken with sharp inhales of breath and weakening knees. Their closeness really isn’t something her cerebrum enjoys, apparently, so she funnels her blinding migraine into her trembling fists, hoping to disperse the pain through her fingertips. 

“Really?” Yaz counters at her side, turning her head to bare a sudden burst of optimism through the smile she sends in her direction. “Guess you’ll have to find out and see, huh?” then, less confidently, “This is going to work, right?” 

“‘Course it is — things always work out if you believe, and if you think hard enough. That’s my motto. Shall we get a shift on?” For some reason, the Doctor feels inclined to reach between them, to tangle their hands together. Yaz has lovely hands, she finds herself thinking. She really wouldn’t mind, but she chooses not to take the risk for now. “Boys? I’d suggest holding onto something.”

The second the Doctor fixes the connecting cables to her temples, sweeping her blonde locks behind her ears in the process, Yaz gasps. 

She’s somersaulted through the void linking their minds, falling and falling and falling into a seemingly endless abyss. 

On the outside, the Doctor has already begun hissing in building anguish, gripping to the console as waves crash over her suddenly vulnerable form. It’s as though she’s stuck in rapids with no swimming expertise, trying desperately, cluelessly, to fight against the currents. 

Graham and Ryan can only watch on from the outer sphere, fingers crossed, silent prayers falling from otherwise agnostic tongues. 

When Yaz finally gets where she wants to be, she’s amused to find the Doctor’s words presenting themselves in a literal fashion. A barrier keeps her from one specific direction, blocked off by an invisible force she can’t seem to slip through. 

_ Think outside the box, PC Khan. Come on, you’ve been trained for this. If something’s blocking your path, what do you do? _

When attempts to throw herself at the transparent wall fail, Yaz sighs, reaching out to touch and prod for any weakness in its structure instead. 

_ Things always work out if you think hard enough, _Yaz repeats the Doctor’s words as if they were spoken by a great god, which, she guesses, isn’t far off. 

So, she thinks. 

She conjures up images of their first meeting aboard a train so many months ago, of their first proper adventure, of their first steps aboard her endless ship. 

She thinks of stolen glances, then stolen words, stolen touches, stolen kisses. Their first kiss was the result of pure adrenaline after a close-call which almost made their primary confessions Yaz’s last.

She thinks of the way the Doctor’s lips taste, the way they curve and mould and move against her own.

She thinks of wandering hands, of the sound the Doctor makes when her lips are pressed against the space below her ear. 

She thinks of their first official date, their first night together, their first time. 

The Doctor is crying and shaking and whimpering as the walls built perfectly within her brain begin to crack and fissure. 

Beside her writhing form, silent tears roll down Yaz’s cheeks and her ears begin to ring — a warning, perhaps? A plea to go no further from the species which discarded her from her own girlfriend’s memory? 

_ Sod that, _Yaz responds, surging forward, tearing at clear restrictions. 

She thinks of the first time she realised she saw the Doctor as something _ more — _ more than an alien, more than a friend, more than a _ girlfriend _. 

Three powerful, honest, but destructive words linger in her thoughts. Three syllables, none more important than the other, but when placed in the right order, enough to tear planets apart, enough to burn up suns, enough to make the most closed-off, reserved characters sink to their knees and bare all. 

_ I love you, _Yaz cries into the remnants of a once solid, stable structure, stepping through to a chorus of shaky cries and a sudden thump.

When Yaz next opens her eyes, iron assaults her tongue and the space behind her eyes thrums with the beginning of a headache. She scrambles over to the spot where a blood-stained rainbow hugs the Doctor’s dozing form. Hesitating before she lifts her lolling head into her lap. 

“Doctor? Are you with me? Please_ , please _say it worked,” she casts a prayer into the chasms of gold above their heads, only glancing away from the blonde when Ryan and Graham return to gather around their aching forms. 

Hazel-green eyes flutter open then squeeze shut once more, as though pained, and dread settles deep in Yaz’s gut. 

_ It didn’t work, _ she thinks to herself, beginning to peel away to defuse the Doctor’s discomfort before a clammy, blood-stained hand catches her wrist. 

“Yaz, why do you have two heads?” the Time Lord croaks, expression serious, brows furrowing and lips curling into an adorably confused frown. Then she shrugs, a little loopy with exhaustion. “Not that it matters when you’re so pretty.”

“Ugh, Doctor. That was gross,” Ryan remarks, pulling a face of playful disgust. It doesn’t last long, though, because his two best friends have had one _ hell _ of an evening. “You two alright?”

“That depends — Doctor?” Yaz pipes up gently, fearful to reach out for the hand laid beside her own. She decides it isn’t worth the risk for now. “You know who I am, right?”

“Yasmin Khan, you really think I could forget about you so easily?” the Doctor shuffles forward, wincing when her tired limbs complain. She cradles Yaz’s hand in both of her own and presses gentle, affectionate kisses to her knuckles. “You’re my girlfriend, my best friend, and you just single-handedly fought a virus inside my head. You’re stronger than you give yourself credit for.” 

She looks like she might kiss her, and suddenly Yaz fights the urge to cry happy tears. 

Inches from her lips, the Doctor gasps. “Ten points to Yaz, I’d say! Now, fam, where are we off to today?” When she moves to stand on jelly legs, she catches herself on the console with a faint ‘oof’. 

“I think you’d both better rest up before we even think about going anywhere, Doc,” Graham suggests kindly, “Don’t worry, I’m sure Ryan and I can entertain ourselves while you’re gone.” 

“Grandad’s right — plus, there’s a load of new games to get through in the gaming room. Just come and find us when you’re ready,” Ryan encourages, stepping forward when the Doctor lurches slightly. 

Yaz is at her side in an instant, winding an arm around her shoulders and lifting one of the blonde’s own to curl around her neck. “I’ve got you. C’mon, let’s get you to bed.” 

She’s cleaning up her girlfriend’s bloodied nose and chin with a cool flannel ten minutes later, having tackled the Time Lord into a pair of comfy, star-speckled pyjamas, when her eyes slip closed and her head tips forward. “Hey, hey, let me finish this up first, then you can sleep as long as you like, Doctor.” 

“You keep calling me Doctor,” the blonde murmurs sleepily, lashes flitting when she blinks slowly. Her tone is a little forlorn, like a child on Christmas morning being kept from opening their presents. “You usually call me ‘babe’, or — or ‘love’.” 

Yaz falters in her movements, lips parting but no words coming forth. She averts her gaze when the Doctor’s frown becomes too prominent to bear, reaching up to card her fingers through her dishevelled bun. “When the woman you may or may not love is wiped of your entire existence, it knocks you back a bit.”

“So, what you’re really saying is — you’re giving me an easy way out?” the blonde concludes, tilting her head. Her expression shifts, crestfallen, but determination undermines the anguish still ever-present in green pools. “You wildly underestimate my feelings towards you, Yaz. I’d never give you up so easily.” 

Her whispered reassurances bring moisture to the corners of Yaz’s eyes, silent tears dropping like raindrops from rusted gutters in mid-winter. She lifts her gaze, seeking sincerity, and finds just what she’s looking for. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have even insinuated — you’re worth more than a stupid virus. It’ll take more than that to keep me from you, I just — I can’t keep the image of you from my head. You didn’t recognise me, Doctor.” She takes a shaky inhale, fingers itching to entwine with those so close, but she’s scared. She’s scared she’ll spiral her into a whirlwind of agony again.

“Oh, _ Yaz,” _ the Time Lord whispers, reaching up to catch a tear as it falls. She can’t say she hasn’t noticed Yaz’s hesitation to lessen their proximity, but wounds take time to heal, and they have all the time in the universe. “I’m here now, I’m fine, I’m — _ whole _again, all thanks to you. You’re brilliant, Yasmin Khan.” 

Weepy laughter falls past her lips when Yaz finally meets her warm, open gaze, sending her a doting, affectionate smile. She shifts when her girlfriend shows signs of all but passing out again, peeling back the sheets and helping her manoeuvre herself beneath them. 

The Doctor settles with a groan, muscles crying out with relief. When Yaz falters, she opens her arms in invitation, rolling onto her side. “C’mere.”

Yaz is warm and soft and smells like home when the Doctor curls her arms around her form, resting her head against her chest, listening to the steady drumming of her single heart. 

When the younger woman brushes a gentle kiss to the top of her girlfriend’s head, her brows pinch curiously. “Babe?”

The pet name makes the Doctor’s heart flutter in a familiar fashion. She squeezes her hip with the arm draped over her waist, humming against her. “Mm?”

“Did you use my shampoo?” she quips in intrigue, taking in another lungful of the Doctor’s distinctive scent — old books and coffee, mixed with Yaz’s usual component — coconut. 

“Mm. Might’ve, yeah. It helped me relax — made me feel all warm and gooey, too. Guess now it all makes more sense.” She finds Yaz’s hand beneath the sheets, interlocking their fingers in a loose embrace. 

“Warm and gooey?” Yaz teases, but it doesn’t have her usual bite. “You _ are _ over two thousand years old, right?” 

“Oi,” the Doctor counters, words halted by a yawn. “I might not be the best with words, but I can tell what love is when I feel it.” 

Beneath her, Yaz goes quiet, but her heartbeat hastens in the Doctor’s ears. 

“You love me?” she whispers a full minute later, curling her fingers blindly through the alien’s blonde tresses. Her heart is brimming, her mind swirling. 

“‘Course I do, silly,” the Doctor replies as though it’s the most obvious statement she’s ever made. She lifts her head, regarding her counterpart in the low light of billions of stars above. “Here was me thinking _ I _ was the slow one today.”

Yaz scoffs, reaching out to cradle the Doctor’s cheek in her palm. 

She leans into her touch like a feline, tilting her head into the comfort she blindly offers, lashes tickling her skin. 

“I love you too,” Yaz indulges, sighing out the instant the Doctor closes the distance between them with a kiss. It tastes just like their first. 

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!!! kudos and comments are always appreciated if you have the time!!!


End file.
